CONSERVATIVE Christopher Chope has held Christchurch for the sixth consecutive election.

Chope increased his majority in the constituency to over 25,000, up from his previous majority of just over 18,000.

The video below is filmed on the side for the first minute but it is correct around the one minute mark, so please bear with it! 

The total vote for the Conservatives was 35,230.

Mr Chope said: "I think it's a pity this result is not being replicated across the country because we've increased our share of the votes and that's absolutely a great credit to my campaign team.

"I think there's a very clear message coming from the people of Christchurch on the two biggest issues that we campaigned. The national issue of delivering Brexit and the local issue of keeping our sovereign independent councils."

Labour over-doubled their vote tally from 2015 from 4,745 to 10,059. Candidate Patrick Canavan said: "I'm not surprised that the Conservatives won, but I'm very pleased with our vote. That's more than twice what we got last time.

"Mr Chope was talking about the percentage of his vote (over 70%), but we know where that's come from, that's come from UKIP and that's no real surprise here. Elsewhere tonight it's been a good night for the Labour party so we're very pleased."

The Liberal Democrats increased their vote by just under a thousand to 4,020.

Candidate Mike Cox said: "It's not too bad but we were fighting against the national issue where there was personality politics. In view of the circumstances and the short amount of time I had to prepare for it to increase the vote, given the fact that we were being squeezed, is not bad."

The Green party received 1,321 votes, while 161 were rejected.

The overall turnout was 50,790 (72.2%), out of the 70,311 who were eligible to vote, which was slightly higher than in 2015 (72%).

The result was announced approximately an hour ahead of schedule.

Acting Returning Officer David McIntosh said: "The boxes were verified quite quickly. The team have done really well. We have worked steadily. I think the secret is not to try and work too quickly and be accurate but keep the pace up and that's what we've done."